


Burn Against the Cold

by originally



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: First Time, Huddling For Warmth, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-29
Updated: 2015-08-29
Packaged: 2018-04-17 06:31:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4656222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/originally/pseuds/originally
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As young rangers, Mance and Qhorin are caught in a cave in a snowstorm.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Burn Against the Cold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cleromancy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cleromancy/gifts).



It would be just his luck if there were shadowcats in here, Qhorin thought morosely, staring at the blizzard that raged just beyond the cave mouth. They would be trapped until the weather eased and they could see their way through the pass with its treacherous rocks below, and who knew how long that might take?

“It could be worse,” Mance said, pressing his shoulder companionably to Qhorin’s as they huddled down in their cloaks against the freezing stone. “There could be shadowcats.”

Qhorin groaned. “Then you should hush unless you want to attract their attention.”

“At least it would pass the time. Might be more interesting company, even,” Mance said. His eyes gleamed with familiar mischief.

Knowing better than to engage him in these little sparring matches, Qhorin settled for glancing at him askance and digging into his pack for a knife and his piece of weirwood. This ranging had dragged on for several days longer than expected already, so he’d had time both to fashion a very passable stag and to grow weary of Mance’s constant needling.

Surprisingly, they sat in a comfortable silence a while, broken only by the howls of the wind outside and the distant sounds of creatures abroad in the night. Qhorin felt the weight of Mance’s gaze on his hands as he worked.

“The free folk have a song about a white hart,” Mance said eventually, shifting so that their bodies pressed together, shoulder to thigh.

Qhorin leaned away from him, though in truth the warmth was appealing. “I suppose your mother sang you to sleep with it as a babe.”

“No, it was that beauty we met at Whitetree on the way north.”

“Mance,” Qhorin said, hearing the note of warning in his own voice. He felt as if he said that name that way half a hundred times or more every day. When they burned him on his pyre, they’d probably find it branded on his bones. “Why don’t you rest? I’ll take first watch.”

Mance only grinned at him, unrepentant as always. Qhorin sometimes despised his seemingly boundless energy for conversation and song and pleasure. More than that, Mance had that strange, beguiling quality of bards that drew others to them. There had been many an evening where he had sat on a table in front of the fire in the Shadow Tower’s main hall, fingers caressing his lute strings and fine, clear tenor voice weaving melancholy tales of ancient kings and bawdy tavern songs alike, as all the while brothers joined the crowd until the room was heaving with them, held rapt and spellbound or else roaring artlessly along. Qhorin had never heard a man request a song Mance didn’t know, nor, for that matter, one of the innumerable women that he seemed to charm wherever he went and vows be damned. Qhorin himself had neither the skill nor the inclination to seek out girls with which to break his oath, something that provided Mance with a steady supply of jibes and teasing words.

Qhorin pulled his cloak more tightly around his shoulders, caught between the practicality of sharing heat with Mance and his desire to put distance between them, to quell his growing feeling of irritation. Perhaps he should let Mance take the first watch instead. It had been days since they’d last slept in a sheltered spot, after all, and it would do him good to relieve some of his bone-tiredness. He stowed his whittling in his pack, and met Mance’s eyes briefly before closing his and leaning back against the wall. He felt more aware of Mance’s body pressed against him than he ought, of the warmth radiating from him like wildfire, of his steady breathing and reassuring solidness at Qhorin’s side. 

It could have been innocent when Mance shifted and let his hand fall to Qhorin’s thigh. It could have been nothing, just the consequence of the small space and Mance's natural restlessness. When Mance's hand drifted higher, though, brushing Qhorin's cock, a small, shameful sound of want escaped him. Mance took it as an invitation to fit their bodies together, to bury his face in Qhorin’s neck and breathe him in.

This was more than he had anticipated. Of course Qhorin had shared a bedroll with a brother before and taken his release where he could get it, and, if he was honest with himself, he had been half hoping for it and half dreading it here. But those past fumbles had always been brisk, impersonal, concluded with merely a grunt of acknowledgement and no more contact than necessary. Mance was wanton in his desire, pressing himself closer and dragging his lips over the exposed parts of Qhorin’s skin. He touched Qhorin’s face gently with a gloved hand, as if he were a woman in need of coddling and reassurance, and Qhorin felt his temper fray.

“I’m not one of your wildling doxies to be petted and primed, Mance,” he growled. “Just get on with it, if you’re going to.”

Mance laughed. “Are you so fearful of tenderness, Qhorin? No wonder you always look so grim.”

“Did your father sire you on some sphinx, that you should vex me so with words?”

This time, Mance’s warm laughter turned into a hiss as Qhorin sank his teeth into the tender flesh of his throat; if Mance thought that Qhorin would be passive in this, he could think again.

“Gods, Qhorin,” Mance breathed, that beguiling voice low and rousing against Qhorin’s ear, and Qhorin abandoned his last shred of pretence at distance. He had height and bulk on Mance and he used it to his advantage, sitting bestride him and holding him fast against the cave wall. Unashamed heat flashed in Mance’s bright eyes in the second before Qhorin bent to capture his lips.

This was nothing like the gentle kisses Qhorin had shared before he took the black, kisses with milkmaids and tavern wenches with wide hips and soft, yielding bodies. Mance’s lips were cold and weather-roughened, his body naught but lean sinew and sharp edges under Qhorin’s roaming hands. Mance tasted sour, like cheap wine and a week’s ranging, but his clever tongue was slick against Qhorin’s, making want spark hot and ravenous in him. He was stiff, cock straining awkwardly against his breeches, and when he ground down, he felt a little thrill to find that Mance was too. 

Mance gasped and swore and fumbled off one of his gloves. He tore at first Qhorin’s laces and then his own, clumsy with cold and arousal. His fingers were rough with calluses, relics of sword and lute and hard work, and they rasped against Qhorin’s skin when he closed them around both of their cocks. Qhorin pressed his face into Mance’s shoulder, trying to stifle the treacherous sounds that threatened to spill from his lips. There was no hesitation in Mance’s grip, in the way he flicked his wrist, and Qhorin was seized by the thought of the men Mance had bedded before and the urge to scour their touch from his skin. He fit their mouths together again, hungry and graceless, stifling himself before he could say something too earnest. Mance moaned shamelessly and bucked his hips and it was too much, too much sensation, and Qhorin was spilling over both of them, gasping Mance’s name against his lips over and over like a promise.

“Sleep, Qhorin,” Mance said, sly humour back in his voice once they’d both settled back, sated and loose and more relaxed than they could afford, in truth. “Perhaps you’ll be less grim in the morning now.”

Qhorin’s retort died on his tongue as he allowed himself to be tugged into Mance’s warm embrace, flush together under their cloaks as the blizzard raged on.


End file.
